Human Impact Project

A Honduran man who entered the United States on or about August 12, 2021, at age seventeen, and was processed by immigration officials as an unaccompanied child. He was released by the Office of Refugee Resettlement to his brother and a sponsor on August 23, 2021, and has a pending application for asylum and withholding of removal. On or about May 31, 2026, he was taken back into ICE custody after encountering law enforcement due to a driver's license related infraction. He was held at the California City Detention Center. Petitioner filed a habeas corpus petition and a motion for a temporary restraining order seeking immediate release, arguing his prior release by ORR created a liberty interest and that he was being detained under 8 U.S.C. § 1232 rather than mandatory detention provisions cited by respondents. The court agreed, citing prior similar rulings, granted the habeas petition, ordered his immediate release, and enjoined respondents from re-detaining him without notice and a hearing where the government must prove by clear and convincing evidence that he is a danger or flight risk. The TRO motion was denied as moot given the habeas relief granted.

Gerald Akari Angye, a 35-year-old former high school teacher from Cameroon who fled after experiencing kidnapping and torture, crossed into the U.S. in December 2024 and sought asylum. After his asylum claim was denied, he was detained at Camp East Montana ICE detention center at Fort Bliss military base in El Paso for over a month. While detained, Angye was severely beaten by guards after requesting to speak with an attorney before signing documents, suffering injuries to his hands and wrists that required a brace and hospitalization. He was subsequently placed in solitary confinement for 15 days. The ACLU of Texas and partner civil rights organizations filed a federal class-action lawsuit against ICE on behalf of Angye and three other named plaintiffs, challenging severe conditions at the facility including violent use of force, medical neglect, disease outbreaks, excessive solitary confinement, and inhumane living conditions.

Jose Yugar-Cruz, a Bolivian citizen and torture survivor, entered the U.S. through Arizona in summer 2024 and was immediately detained by border officials. Although his asylum application was denied, a federal judge granted him withholding of removal under the Convention Against Torture, which prevents his deportation to Bolivia. While detained, DHS attempted to send him to Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Mexico, and Canada. After filing a writ of habeas corpus, he was released and began rebuilding his life in Iowa. On April 8, 2026, during what he believed was a routine ICE check-in, officers re-detained him and placed him on a manifest for deportation to the Democratic Republic of Congo—a country experiencing war and an Ebola outbreak where he had no ties and was scheduled for removal on April 15. His attorney filed an emergency motion the same day; a federal judge barred DHS from removing him outside the country pending further notice, and he was released on May 29, 2026. At his next ICE check-in, over 250 supporters, including activists, clergy, and elected officials, attended to prevent further detention.

Alejandro, a 10th-grade student at Churchill High School, and his father Jairo were detained by ICE on May 17, 2026 while driving to an after-school soccer game in San Antonio. Unmarked vehicles surrounded their car and transported them to the South Texas Family Residential Center in Dilley. Both are asylum seekers who followed proper legal procedures to enter the country. During detention, Alejandro reported difficulty eating and emotional distress while missing critical final days of his school year and his mother. U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro visited them on May 26 and advocated for their release, citing the need for humane treatment. Following these advocacy efforts, their release was set to occur.

A 23-year-old South American woman was granted protection from deportation to her home country by an immigration judge in June 2025 after fleeing persecution based on her queer identity. Despite this ruling, ICE has held her in Richwood Correctional Center in Monroe, Louisiana for over a year while seeking to deport her to the Democratic Republic of Congo, a country where she has never been and where she would face serious risks.

Hilary Murungi Timbigamba, a 34-year-old asylum seeker from Uganda, was arrested on larceny charges in Massachusetts in July 2025 while employed at a group home. He was taken into federal custody as he left the courthouse despite being granted pretrial release. Federal Judge Landya McCafferty ruled that his 10-month detention in ICE custody violated his constitutional right to due process because he was deprived of the opportunity to address criminal charges and the evidence presented at his immigration bond hearing was legally insufficient. He was released within 24 hours of the court order.

Ricardo Navarrete (also reported as Hernandez-Navarrete), an 18-year-old senior at Mather High School in Chicago, and his mother Liliana were detained by ICE agents on March 16, 2026, outside Chicago Immigration Court during what they believed was a routine check-in for their pending asylum case. The family had fled Colombia in 2022; Ricardo held a valid work permit and REAL ID with no criminal record and had been accepted to play soccer at Truman College. After detention, the two were separated and Ricardo was transferred between facilities in Oklahoma, Louisiana, Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, where he reported sleeping on floors without blankets and being held in solitary confinement. Attorneys filed a habeas corpus petition on his behalf; Liliana was released on May 19 after a federal judge ordered her release, and Ricardo was released on May 26, reuniting with her in Crown Point, Indiana. He is required to wear a wrist monitor and check in daily with immigration officials, and he attended his high school graduation ceremony on May 28, 2026, receiving his diploma.

On May 18, 2026, Rogerio da Silva Lima and his 15-year-old son Nycolas were detained by the U.S. Coast Guard during a recreational fishing trip approximately one mile offshore Martha's Vineyard near Menemsha. Following a vessel safety check, the Coast Guard transferred them to ICE custody at a federal processing facility in Burlington. Da Silva Lima, a Brazilian national who entered the U.S. in 2021 and sought asylum, had a denied asylum application with a removal order issued in 2023-2024. Community advocates and attorneys filed a habeas corpus petition in U.S. District Court of Massachusetts on May 20, which halted a planned transfer to Texas. A federal judge found ICE had exceeded the congressionally mandated 90-day removal period and violated constitutional due process rights. Approximately 200 students at Martha's Vineyard Regional High School, where the son was a freshman, walked out to protest his detention. The teenager was released on May 24 to his older brother, and the father was ordered released by May 28-29.

An Indian citizen who entered the United States on May 4, 2023 seeking asylum from political persecution was placed in removal proceedings and released on his own recognizance. After over three years of compliance with release conditions, he was re-detained by ICE on May 28, 2026 following a scheduled immigration appointment without written notice or a finding of changed circumstances. The court granted his habeas petition, ordering his immediate release and requiring the government to provide seven days' notice and hold a pre-deprivation bond hearing with clear and convincing evidence of flight risk or danger to the community before any future detention.

A Venezuelan maintenance worker at Grandview Resort in Lake Placid was arrested by ICE agents on May 28 when he arrived for work. He has lived in Lake Placid for over two years, holds valid work authorization through a five-year work permit tied to temporary protected status, has never missed an immigration check-in, and has no criminal history. He was one of 14 workers detained during the operation at the resort and was transported 12 hours to Batania Detention Center near Buffalo, where agents restrained detainees and he was held with only water for the journey. Unable to contact his family for three days, he was released on bail after approximately two weeks in detention and now wears an ankle monitor. His wife collapsed upon learning of his arrest. He is pursuing a pending political asylum case and reported experiencing daily fear and trauma, avoiding locations where he was detained.

Yessenia Ruano, a teacher's aide at a bilingual Milwaukee public school and mother of twin daughters who are U.S. citizens, fled El Salvador in 2011 to escape gang violence and later became a victim of human trafficking in the U.S. She had attended 19 in-person ICE check-ins over 14 years and had a pending T-visa application for trafficking survivors when, at her final check-in in May 2025, officials told her she had to leave within days. Facing arrest and separation from her daughters, she self-deported to El Salvador in June 2025, taking her daughters with her while her husband, Miguel, stayed behind temporarily before joining them. Her Milwaukee community rallied around her, gathering 2,800 petition signatures within 24 hours and raising nearly $16,000 for her family. In May 2026, a federal judge ordered that Ruano and two other plaintiffs be allowed to return to the U.S., finding immigration officials had violated federal law and due process by automatically deporting crime victims without considering their pending applications. Her attorney said the government must now review her T-visa petition once she returns.

On May 28, 2026, ICE agents from the Champlain sub-office detained 14 people in a raid at a parking lot on Mirror Lake Drive in Lake Placid. The detainees included approximately a dozen roofers working on a short-term roofing project for a local business and staying in employer-provided workforce housing, as well as a local man with several years of community ties, valid work authorization, and a pending asylum case. According to advocacy groups including North Country Immigrant Allies, all detainees possessed work authorization and were legally permitted to reside and work in the United States. All detainees were transported to a detention facility in Batavia, approximately 300 miles away. Local law enforcement was not aware of the operation.

Sister Agnes, a Catholic nun from China who had won asylum in the United States, was detained by ICE earlier this year. Even after she won bond in court, ICE refused to release her and kept her in prison for months. She was eventually released to be with her religious community.

Luis Fernando Cabrera Chavarria, an 18-year-old senior and varsity soccer goalie at Northeast Early College High School in Austin, was detained by ICE after a Texas Department of Public Safety trooper stopped him for an expired registration sticker while he was driving home from an overnight shift at Popeyes. Body camera footage showed the trooper photographing his school ID and using the encrypted app Signal to contact federal agents, who instructed him to detain Cabrera under a 287(g) agreement. He was transferred to the Karnes County Immigration Processing Center, more than 100 miles from Austin. Cabrera's family came to the U.S. from Honduras and applied for asylum in 2019, though the application was not filed correctly; he had no deportation order or criminal history. His detention prompted protests from classmates and support from his school and St. James Episcopal Church. U.S. District Judge Jason Pulliam ordered his release, barred DHS from deporting him while his asylum case proceeds, and allowed him to take final exams and attend his graduation on June 2.

Karliana Yosdeylin Perdomo-Gotopo, a 20-year-old women's soccer player and business major at Cleary University in Michigan, was detained by ICE on May 26, 2026, during a traffic stop in Lincoln Park. Perdomo entered the U.S. as an unaccompanied minor in September 2022 at age 15, fleeing political persecution in Venezuela, and graduated high school with honors in Detroit in 2023. She had a pending asylum application and her mother believed she held valid Temporary Protected Status documentation through October 2026, though the Trump administration had previously ended TPS protections for Venezuelan nationals. A witness reported the stop appeared targeted based on her Latina appearance. Perdomo was transferred to North Lake Correctional Facility in Baldwin, Michigan.

Henry Morales Hernandez, 55, a former Venezuelan Army Major with an active asylum case, has been detained by ICE since May following a traffic stop in Florida. Prosecutors dismissed the driving under the influence charge, with breath test results below the legal limit. Morales Hernandez arrived legally on a tourist visa in 2021 and has been granted Temporary Protected Status while his asylum case proceeds in immigration court.

Anabella Gyasi, 38, a pregnant Ghanaian woman, and her 4-year-old son who has a physical abnormality affecting his hands arrived at Dulles International Airport on valid tourist visas to seek medical care for her son at Akron Children's Hospital in Ohio. At customs, she disclosed a fear of returning to Ghana because of persecution she faced for her son's disability. CBP officers took them into custody as asylum seekers after she stated under oath that she did not intend to return to Ghana, which led officials to nullify her tourist visa. Gyasi, who was about four months pregnant, was held in a windowless room at the airport with her son for more than a week without adequate food or medical care. She was twice transported to a hospital for treatment. DHS denied her care was inadequate. The ACLU of Virginia filed an emergency petition, and Judge Leonie Brinkema called the detention a "terrible situation," saying Gyasi should not spend another night at the airport. A Justice Department attorney said immigration authorities were prepared to deport Gyasi and her son back to Ghana that night. CBP had interviewed her and judged she did not have a "credible fear" of returning. The judge ordered the government to confirm her departure and ruled the petition moot. Gyasi and her son were deported to Ghana.

Dolores Bustamante Romero, a 54-year-old apple picker and farmworker advocate from Wayne County, New York, was detained by ICE on April 22, 2026, during a mandatory check-in appointment at the Buffalo office without notice that her supervised release was being revoked. A Mexican national who fled gender violence in 2003 and arrived in the U.S. seeking asylum, Bustamante has lived in upstate New York since 2012 and was a well-known advocate for migrant farmworkers and member of Alianza Agricola. She was instrumental in securing New York's Green Light Law and an executive order banning State Police from inquiring about immigration status. She had no criminal record and had attended four previous check-in appointments without incident while enrolled in an alternatives-to-detention program under the Biden administration. U.S. District Judge Meredith Vacca ordered ICE to return her to Western New York and held an evidentiary hearing on May 26, 2026, to review whether ICE violated her due process rights by detaining her without proper notice.

J.R., a 35-year-old Colombian with valid work authorization and an ankle monitor through ICE's Intensive Supervision Appearance Program, attended what he believed was a routine monitor maintenance appointment. ICE officers detained him instead, confiscating his ID and work permit. He was held overnight at the Aurora detention center despite having a pending appeal of his asylum case and was released the following day with assistance from Casa de Paz.

Daniel Romero, 18, a Colombian national and recent graduate of Ooltewah High School in Tennessee, was taken into ICE custody on May 18, 2026, during what his family believed was a routine appointment related to an immigration program. ICE cited missed check-ins and failure to submit required weekly photos as reasons for detention. Romero's family disputed the allegations, claiming the check-in app malfunctioned for four weeks and provided documented evidence of the technical error, but officials did not allow Romero to present this proof before his arrest. Records provided by the family indicated compliance with program requirements. He was held at Etowah County Jail in Alabama before being transferred to a detention center in Louisiana, where no bond, video calls, or visitation were allowed.